Attention control: Relationships between self-report and behavioural measures,and symptoms of anxiety and depression

Previous research has demonstrated differences in processing between fear-relevant stimuli, such as snakes and spiders, and non-fear-relevant stimuli. The current research examined whether non-fear-relevant animal stimuli, such as dogs, birds and fish, were processed like fear-relevant stimuli following aversive learning. Pictures of a priori fear-relevant animals, snakes and spiders, were evaluated as negative in affective priming and ratings and were preferentially attended to in a visual search task. Pictures of dogs, birds and fish that had been trained as CS+ in an aversive conditioning design were evaluated more negatively and facilitated dot probe detection relative to CS? pictures. The current studies demonstrated that stimuli viewed as positive prior to aversive learning were negative and were preferentially attended to after a brief learning episode. We propose that aversive learning may provide a mechanism for the acquisition of stimulus fear relevance.     

心理学视角下社交网络用户个体行为分析

以社交网络的典型代表Facebook为例, 以社交网络用户个体行为为着眼点, 从个体使用社交网络的动机、社交网络用户个体行为的主要表现及其影响因素和结果变量四个方面, 梳理国外心理学领域有关社交网络的最新研究成果。今后研究可以在社交网络用户个体行为的测量、样本代表性、线上和线下社交网络的交互作用、具体人格特质变量的预测作用以及对社交网络功能的动态考察等方面推进已有研究。     

Alertness in young healthy subjects: An fMRI study of brain region interactivity enhanced by a warning signal

An effective connectivity study was carried out on 16 young, healthy subjects performing an alertness task. The objective of this study was to develop and to evaluate a putative network model of alertness by adapting structural equation modeling to fMRI data. This study was designed to evaluate the directed interactivity of an attentional network during intrinsic and phasic alerting tasks. On the basis of theoretical hypotheses, clinical observations, behavioral data and neuroimaging studies, it was hypothesized that neural circuits in the right hemisphere including the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), anterior cingulate cortex, inferior parietal cortex and the thalamus were involved. The results of this study support the existence of a common network of activated areas with significant path coefficient differences between intrinsic and phasic alertness. Functional interactivity was significantly reinforced during the phasic alertness task and appeared to preferentially involve activity in the DLPFC region, whereas the path coefficients of the model were well-balanced during intrinsic alertness. This study highlights the predominant role of the DLPFC region in maintenance of a state of alertness and in temporal preparation during an alertness task.     

The practice research network: Research into practice,practice into research

The purpose of the broader project on which this report is based was to utilize a Practice Research Network, an alternative to traditional clinical studies to 1) identify demographically one practice group, namely professional counselors in the United States, 2) describe their practice patterns, and 3) identify their client population and the efficacy of their clinical work through client outcomes based on actual client reports. This article describes the development of one such nation‐wide Practice Research Network (PRN) and provides some preliminary findings for each phase of the project. Use of the PRN model can help overcome the traditional “research to practice” gap and provide research results into community practice thus integrating outcomes measures into the daily practice of mental health professionals. During the early phases of this project, a software program was developed upon which the participating practitioners could identify the data elements within the parameters of the focus on their agreed‐upon research interests, enter data following client visits over time, and by comparing their own composite profiles and effectiveness with those of other participating practitioners who had clients presenting with similar diagnoses, could alter their own service delivery patterns, therapeutic interventions, or approaches while working with the clients and thereby improve the efficacy of their service. By participating, the practitioners benefited by access to downloadable and printable reports on profiles of 1) their specific clients, 2) their service delivery patterns, and 3) the outcomes or efficacy by their clients’ direct feedback. They were also able to compare these results with the composite data from other practitioners.     

A short proof of a theorem of Falmagne

Falmagne (J. Math. Psychol. 18 (1978) 52) proved the sufficiency of the Block-Marschak inequalities (in: I. Olkin, S. Ghurye, W. Hoefding, W. Madow, H. Mann (Eds.), Contributions to Probability and Statistics, Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 1960, pp. 97-132) and normalization equalities for a complete system of choice probabilities to be induced by rankings. Here, we give a considerably shorter proof of this result. Our approach combines Möbius inversion and network flows.     

Network Connectivity Dynamics,Cognitive Biases,and the Evolution of Cultural Diversity in Round-Robin Interactive Micro-Societies

The distribution of cultural variants in a population is shaped by both neutral evolutionary dynamics and by selection pressures. The temporal dynamics of social network connectivity, that is, the order in which individuals in a population interact with each other, has been largely unexplored. In this paper, we investigate how, in a fully connected social network, connectivity dynamics, alone and in interaction with different cognitive biases, affect the evolution of cultural variants. Using agent-based computer simulations, we manipulate population connectivity dynamics (early, mid, and late full-population connectivity); content bias, or a preference for high-quality variants; coordination bias, or whether agents tend to use self-produced variants (egocentric bias), or to switch to variants observed in others (allocentric bias); and memory size, or the number of items that agents can store in their memory. We show that connectivity dynamics affect the time-course of variant spread, with lower connectivity slowing down convergence of the population onto a single cultural variant. We also show that, compared to a neutral evolutionary model, content bias accelerates convergence and amplifies the effects of connectivity dynamics, while larger memory size and coordination bias, especially egocentric bias, slow down convergence. Furthermore, connectivity dynamics affect the frequency of high-quality variants (adaptiveness), with late connectivity populations showing bursts of rapid change in adaptiveness followed by periods of relatively slower change, and early connectivity populations following a single-peak evolutionary dynamic. We evaluate our simulations against existing data collected from previous experiments and show how our model reproduces the empirical patterns of convergence.     

Critical appraisal of the discussion on delay discounting by Bailey et al. and Stein et al.: A scientific proposal for a reinforcer pathology theory 3.0

Delay discounting is one of the most studied phenomena in Psychology in the last decades. Recently, it has been proposed as a transdiagnostic variable accounting for several psychopathological problems. A review of current practices and clinical application (Bailey et al., 2021) and a response article (Stein et al., 2022) have been recently published. Despite both of them being stimulating, the articles raise issues needing further discussion. The first part of the present article critically appraises both publications by highlighting their strengths/limitations and offers an alternate perspective that clarifies some theoretical issues and allows new lines in research. In the second part, one of these new lines of research is presented by describing a research proposal based on the analysed critiques and current developments in both psychopathology and addiction research. This article contributes to the discussion on delay discounting suggesting alternative interpretations and future studies to improve theoretical models.     

Message from the Ecumenical Disability Advocates Network Pre-Assembly Meeting

This is the message of the meeting of the Ecumenical Disability Advocates Network held before the 11th Assembly of the World Council of Churches in Karlsruhe, Germany, August–September 2022. The network recognized the God-given gifts of people with disabilities and the importance of making available those gifts for the body of Christ to function fully. It called on churches to continue to develop and encourage more people with disabilities to be involved in church leadership at local and denominational levels, and for wider representation in WCC assemblies and activities, especially for non-speaking people: people who communicate through alternative and augmentative devices and people who are neurodivergent, have learning disabilities, or have invisible disabilities.     

Brokering the Research–Practice Gap: A typology

Despite widespread recognition of a research–practice gap in multiple service sectors, less is known about how pre‐existing communication channels facilitate the flow of information between researchers and practitioners. In the current study, we applied an existing typology of brokerage developed by Gould and Fernandez (Sociol Methodol 19:89–126, 1989 ) to examine what types of brokerage facilitate information spread between researchers and educational practitioners. Specifically, we conducted semi‐structured interviews with 19 school administrators and staff in two public school districts regarding their experiences searching for information about instructional, health, and social skills programs. Using deductive content analysis, we found evidence of all five types of brokerage identified by Gould and Fernandez ( 1989 ). However, only three types of brokerage—gatekeepers, representatives, and liaisons—were involved in the flow of information between school administrators and researchers. Moreover, information transfer often occurred in longer chains that involved multiple, distinct types of brokerage. We conclude with the broad implications of our findings for narrowing the research–practice gap by improving researchers’ dissemination efforts and practitioners’ search for information.